


To Shine On All

by WolffyLuna



Category: Dragon Age: Origins
Genre: Dialogue Heavy, Elf Culture & Customs, Established Relationship, F/F, Fluff and Hurt/Comfort, Horror, Hurt/Comfort, Nightmares, Religious Discussion
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-09-29
Updated: 2018-09-29
Packaged: 2019-06-29 14:35:50
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,948
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15731409
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/WolffyLuna/pseuds/WolffyLuna
Summary: “You were, uh, talking in your sleep,” Camellia said. She paused. “You sounded like you were having a nightmare.”Leliana turned over to face her. “I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to wake you up.”“No, no, it’s okay—it’s good that you woke me up.”“Oh.” She sat up too. “You too?”Leliana and Tabris both have nightmares, and comfort each other after.





	To Shine On All

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Lady_Katana4544](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Lady_Katana4544/gifts).



> I hope you like this, Lady_Katana4544! I had fun writing this. 
> 
> Many thanks to chocochipbiscuit, for beta-ing this and helping make this so much better.

The corridor stretched out into darkness, the junction at the end hidden in shadow. Dark wood doors, dark as night, dark as dreams, loomed across the walls.

Camellia Tabris adjusted the grip on her swords, and took a deep breath.

It didn’t do anything. Her heart still battered against her chest.

She could do this. She had to do this. Shianni and Leliana were at the centre of the castle. They were in trouble, and if she didn’t get to them… she had to get to them. _She had to_. The certainty of that beat in her chest as hard as her heart.

She took a step forwards.

A door crashed open. It shattered as it hit the ground.

Camellia twisted to avoid splinters flying into her eye.

Something struck the side of her head. She ducked, rushed forward to stab it.

The Hurlock jerked back, and fell. The rest of darkspawn took the opportunity to surround her.

She swung her blade in a flurry. If she could just get around them, get through them, flank them, it would be over. But the press of darkspawn was too tight.

Every hit she scored was a hit she took.

Swing, thrust, stab- one down. Pivot, thrust at the one trying to smash her head in. Pivot again.

Darkspawn blood dripped down her arms, mixing and mingling with her own. She would be tainted. The certainty dripped down her hands to the floor.

She had to do this.

The darkspawn fell in time with her heartbeat, struck her in time to her heartbeat. It was a horrible clock, ticking down to her doom. What doom? She didn’t know.

It ticked down to the time where she couldn’t save Shianni and Leliana, would be faced with a terrible choice. It ticked down to when she couldn’t save either at all. It ticked down to when she would be tainted. It ticked down to when she would die. It ticked down until she had killed too many, the guilt a dark stain on her soul, keeping her from the Maker’s light.

It ticked down.

The darkspawn lay in circle all around her, dead. Their blood mixed and mingled on the floor. She stepped forwards, and walked towards the end of the corridor.

She had to get to Shianni and Leliana.

Every corridor stank of darkspawn blood, the compost-and-meat smell invading her nose. There was an undernote as well, wafting from the walls and their hangings. Dead roses and alcohol, fermented fruit, musk. It was perfume, she guessed. Perfume and wine.

She was lost. Two lefts, two rights, and she walked past the same faded tapestry of a boar hunt. Four lefts _didn’t_ take past it. She had to get to the centre, but every turn took her further away. The certainty ached her feet.

Doors shattered, fell, darkspawn poured out of them. There was no predictable pattern. Sometimes she could walk down three corridors with no darkspawn, each door she walked past ratcheting her shoulders up to her ears, ratcheting up the certainty that it _had to be_ the next door. Sometimes it was two doors in a row, and she had no time to get her breath back. (She never had time to get her breath back. She panted, each breath feeling like she was breathing in hot glass, breathing in fire.)

She fought for her life every time, every mob of darkspawn that surrounded her. She fought for Shianni’s and Leliana’s lives. The darkspawn blood soaked into her wounds, burned through her veins like lye.

Each sword strike brought her a _tick_ closer to Shianni’s doom. Each heart beat brought her a _tock_ closer to Leliana’s doom.

Her feet caught on a dusty rug, and she half tripped before she caught herself. The corridors were getting thinner –the walls pressed in closer—and the tapestries became more frequent and finely made. The rose stench got stronger. She had to be getting close to the centre--

The complex had been silent, aside from the war-screams of the darkspawn and the deafening crashes of the door. Now it moaned.

Each door whimpered as she walked them.

She opened one, in case it was Leliana—It was a dark store room, sacks of flour looming against the walls, casting deep shadows across the floor. There was no one there, at least right now- torn dresses were flung over the sacks, spots of bright colour against the undyed sackcloth.

She closed the door, and kept walking.

The doors kept moaning. She tried to ignore it, but it got louder. She covered her ears, as best she could without dropping her swords.

It got louder, closer.

“Shut up.”

It was right behind her ear—

Camellia woke up with a start.

Not a full ‘sit up and scream’ start. She’d never quite managed that. Her eyes opened, as the rest of her body shook off the stillness of sleep.

It was dark, dark enough that she could barely see her hand in front of her. Her heart still thumped in her chest, making a valiant attempt at escaping. Her legs screamed at her to run, to flee into the night.

She lay on her side, on a bed roll with a twig under it, the warm weight of Leliana behind her back.

Leliana was whimpering.

Camellia rolled over, and sat up. “Leliana?” she said, softly, trying to wake her up.

The whimpering got louder. More distressed.

“Leliana.”

The whimpering turned into a worryingly clear and quiet “Help me—“

“Leliana!”

“Hmmf, hello?”

“You were, uh, talking in your sleep,” Camellia said. She paused. “You sounded like you were having a nightmare.”

Leliana turned over to face her. “I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to wake you up.”

“No, no, it’s okay—it’s good that you woke me up.”

“Oh.” She sat up too. “You too?”

“Mhhm. I think—I think there’s darkspawn a mile away. I’d have to check with Alistair to be sure.” It was a bad lie, Camellia knew. It came out shaky and weird and fake and she was far too rattled to say anything convincing.

“Are they coming this way?” Leliana asked. (Playing along, Camellia guessed.)

Camellia cocked her head, and twitched her ear, like she was listening for the darkspawn – which was a pointless performance, she realised as soon as she did it. Firstly because that was not how sensing darkspawn _worked_ , and Leliana knew that. Secondly because it was dark, and Leliana wouldn’t be able to see it anyway, even if it was convincing. “I don’t think so.”

“That is good.” Leliana leaned up against Camellia, pressing their heads temple-to-temple.

“Are you alright? I haven’t asked you yet.”

Leliana laughed hollowly. “Well, I’ve certainly had worse nights.”

“But you have had better,” she echoed.

“That’s true. At least I have someone lovely to cuddle up to.” She wrapped an arm around Camellia’s waist. “Are you alright?”

“I don’t think—I don’t think I’ll be able to sleep till the darkspawn have moved on.” Still a bad lie-- about the darkspawn, not about being unable to sleep. That was perfectly true and convincing. Her heart slowed, but it was still trying to batter its way out of her chest and make its break for freedom.

“I don’t think I’ll be able to go back to sleep either.” Leliana started finger combing Camellia’s hair, and Camellia leaned into the touch. “You know, Lady Cecillie told me when I was young, that if I said all my prayers every night, the demons would be too scared of me to give me bad dreams.”

“I was told that one too, by my father. And I was told that if I got the tallest twig off the vhenandahl, and put it under my pillow, my nightmares would get all tangled up in it, and they wouldn’t bother me.”

Leliana combed through a particular stubborn knot, pulling it apart. The gentle push-pull felt nice. Grounding. Camellia didn’t feel half as much need to sprint to Denerim and check if Shianni was okay.

“Did you ever try that?” Leliana asked.

“You knows those cures –like ‘hop three times, scoop a coin out of well with a teaspoon, and you’ll never have a cold again’—that are _possible_ , but are so hard to do no one tries? And because no one tried it, you can say it would have worked if they did? It was one of those, I think.” Camellia cocked her head. “I couldn’t climb the vhenandahl back then anyway. I could now, but I think I’d feel too silly to try. And it still wouldn’t work.”

“Lavender might work better. Even if it didn’t keep the nightmares away, at least you’d smell good.” 

“And you wouldn’t get stuck halfway up an important tree trying to get it.”

Leliana twisted Camellia’s hair up into a bun, and tied it up with one her ribbons. .

“So, I have a somewhat heretical question.” Camellia leaned onto Leliana’s shoulder. Up close, she could smell the Andraste’s Grace Leliana put in her pillow. “I understand if you don’t want to answer it, it being heretical and all.”

“Provided you do not mind a heretic answering it.”

Camellia smiled, and snuggled up more. “You’re my favourite heretic. Why did the Maker make nightmares? He likes us mortals. I mean, I guess that’s a question to ask about all bad things ever, really.”

“Some say it is because the Maker has turned away from this world.” She sounded like she was reciting it out of a book.

“I know you don’t believe that.”

“I did say I was a heretic.” She smiled. “Some say nightmares are the folly of the spirits who turned away from him, and that they delight in causing nightmares to torment the mortals they are so jealous of.

Some say it is because good only exists in contrast to the bad. That there would be no pleasant dreams if there were no nightmares.”

“Mmm.”

Leliana laughed, bright and not hollow like before. “I do not like that one either. A field of roses can be beautiful without thistles in between.”

“Thistles do have a certain charm to them, with their pink flowers.” She’d attempted to pick a lot of thistles as a child. Got a lot of rashes as a child, too. “I haven’t seen that charm in a darkspawn dream.”

“Some say it is because there is no light without shadow. For the Maker’s light to shine on all, sometimes someone stands between you and it.”

Camellia slipped down, and laid her head on Leliana’s shoulder, the warmth radiating into her cheek. “I like that one. It’s… poetic.”

“Some might even say that your dreams are the shadow of your ability to sense darkspawn, the dark side cast by the light of that ability.”

 _And the shadow of saving Shianni and the others, of standing between, saving them from Vaughn_ , Camellia thought. _The shadow of picking up a sword, and making the world better._ It was a nice thought, all things considering. Turned the fear and the terror into the consequence of doing good. The bad that had to come with the good, for the good to exist. She could live with that. “What’s your light? I don’t mean to pry of course, you don’t have to answer if you don’t want too,” she added hurriedly. 

“The Maker’s, of course,” Leliana said lightly. “And survival, endurance—all of which come from him, like all things.”

Camellia kissed Leliana on the forehead. “That answer suits you. It’s pretty.”

They sat in the dark, pressed close and sharing each other’s warmth, until the grey light of dawn filtered through the tent.


End file.
